“Anaphiel, they’re coming.” Nyx’s excited voice called out to Amara, who was going over her dungeon one last time to make sure she was truly ready for adventurers to come. There was really nothing else she could do until they came as Amara still had 3 hours until the trap research was finished. And unless Amara was going to spend the time until the players found her dungeon, imagining what she could do with the trap research, then all that was left to do was make sure that her floor was ready.

Five forms were quickly racing towards her dungeon’s entrance, and Amara turned her attention towards her first-ever adventurers. The four players reached the portal to her dungeon, and gave a cry of excitement, and sprinted through the portal, probably hoping to be the first ones to discover the location. There was probably an achievement in it, and Amara couldn’t blame them for wanting that achievement. She herself would race for that achievement.

“We did it!” The first member of the group of five went through the portal called out as all of the group finally made it through. Amara studied the group and spotted animal features on them. She was confident that they were a member of the beastman race. She wondered what other races the developers included in the game. But she just had to wait and see. “We got here first! Haha!” Exclaimed one of the female members of the group with white and black cat ears and tail. “We lucked out choosing the cat and wolf beastmen race. It had really good race traits.”

It was the first time that Amara had heard about race traits giving advantages in CMS.

“You really picked up on the scent of the dungeon, Ai.”

One of the male adventurers, Ai, laughed embarrassingly and rubbed the back of his head. “I couldn’t have done it without you guys.”

The other male adventurer spoke again and called out to the rest of the group. “You guys are ready to continue. We better get a move on before the others discover the place of the dungeon portal.”

The fourth adventurer, the female with pitch-black wolf ears, called out. “Ya, Dyx, were all ready to go.”

Dyx smiled at the group and held out his hand. The group had a handshake that they did since they were kids. After a couple of seconds of intricate hand movements, they were ready to explore the dungeon. The group walked and soon met a pair of massive doors that they would usually see in castles. “Alright guys, let’s start.” The group pushed open the doors and officially entered the first floor.

With the entering of the first group to reach her dungeon, an announcement was sent out to all players in this starting area.

Attention: The group, Gy’nx, has discovered the starting area dungeon. The dungeon location will now be locked on all player’s maps within the starting area.

“Heh, do you hear that, guys! We just made everybody’s day easier!” The female wolf beastmen called out, seeming to find the whole thing funny.

“Oh, such Cece. Hey, did you guys gain an achievement too?.” The female cat beastmen lightly scolded Cece, as well as asking about an achievement that she gained

“Fine, fine. You don’t have to be such a buzzkill, Arte. But yes, I got the Octonaut achievement. Did you guys get it too?”

“Ya, I got it. But hey, did you guys see the benefits for it? A 5% increase in XP earned is so awesome. I just can’t believe it!” Exclaimed Ai as he was so excited that they were the ones that gained this achievement, not another group.

Dyx a short whistle in surprise at the reward that the achievement gave. “A permanent 5% increase is going to give us a leg up on the competition. But that doesn’t mean that we can just coast. We are gamers! So let’s get on and play.”

The group continued on as they were lightly bickering and having fun until they reached the opening to the large room that was the first floor. Amara watched the group go, having found their bickering interesting and entertaining. She watched as they stood in slight awe at her dungeon before starting to explore her dungeon.

Amara decided to tune them out for a second. “Hey Nyx, am I able to gain any information from players?”

“Hmm, only basic info like name, class, and level. You just have to pull up their status screens to see this information.” Amara pulled up their status screens and read their information.

Dyx

Warrior

Level 1

Ai

Archer

Level 1

Cece

Mage

Level 1

Arte

Mage Healer

Level 1

The group was all level one and seemed to have basic-ish classes, except Arte, who appeared to be some type of mage healer. She turned her attention back towards the group. What she saw was that they were carefully making their way through the bush, and a moss soldier was creeping upon them.

Amara had watched as the moss soldier jumped at and attacked Ai. The group quickly retaliated. Dyx rushed at the moss soldier and started stabbing it. Cece chanted a short chant before summoning a small ball of fire that she threw at the mob. While Arte started chanting a healing spell to heal Ai of the wounds he obtained. As the Gy’nx group attacked the moss soldier, more moss soldiers began to move closer to the area, activating its unique trait, The Unit.

Soon there were five of the mobs surrounding the group, and they pounced on the group. Arte quickly succumbed to the attack; she was not expecting to be attacked by more moss soldiers. Quickly, Ai then Cece succumbed to the combined attacks of the most soldiers. Dyx managed to kill one of the mobs, levelling up once, before being killed.

Amara did not expect adventurers to fall so easily to one of her weaker mobs. But, what could she expect? Unlike in games or in novels that she had read, the adventurers going into her dungeon were level one. They might have a lot of experience in other games if they were serious gamers. But, they could not gain levels until the players reached the starting area of the game.

Seeing what she just saw, Amara guessed that it would take players a while, probably even longer than the time before she had to leave her virtual reality pod to successfully go against her floor boss.